The Premiere
by Broadwaylover5300
Summary: Corny takes Amber to the premiere of a new William Castle horror movie.


**Hi! Here's that oneshot I promised earlier!**

**This is going to be a little different from most Hairspray fics, but different is good!**

**This story is dedicated to the late, great William Castle, the horror film producer and king of the gimmick!**

**This is just a fun little fic, it's not fluff; I just thought it would be fun to try something like this!**

It was a hot summer day in July 1959. Amber was standing in line with Corny outside the Globe Theater. Corny had graciously volunteered to take Amber to a movie that she had badly wanted to see since she had seen the trailer for it at a double feature. Corny had agreed to take her since Velma had dubbed the movie too crude and vulgar for her. This movie was The Tingler. She had been intrigued by the trailer, which she had seen at a double feature that she had attended with Shelley. This was something that Amber had been eagerly looking forward to, the premiere of the film, an event that was built up even more by the announcement in the trailers of something called "Percepto." The lack of explanation in the trailers as to what Percepto was filled Amber with curiosity. In fact, Amber was really going to see the movie more to see what this Percepto was than to see the movie itself.

Amber followed Corny into the theater and looked around. The theater was all decked out for the premiere, with posters covering the walls, models of what Amber assumed was the Tingler laid out on tables, and a nurse's station next to the theater door, at which a nurse (or what Amber supposed was an actress in a nurse costume), requiring people who were going in to see the movie to sign forms that dissolved all responsibility from the studio if the movie 

scared the patron to death. Amber couldn't help but chuckle at it all, that is, until she noticed a poster near the door, beyond which lay the dark auditorium.

The poster was a yellow color, with a theater chair in the middle of it. Off to the top right, there was a small red circle with "Are you brave enough to sit in this chair?" written in it, with an arrow pointing down to the chair. For some reason, that poster made Amber more nervous than anything else in the theater.

She and Corny walked into the theater with their popcorn and Cokes and sat down in two seats in the back row. They hadn't been in the theater very long when the lights completely dimmed and the screen lit up. A man in a black suit walked onto the screen and turned toward the audience.

"I am William Castle, the director of the feature you are about to see," he began. "I feel obligated to warn you that some of the sensations, some of the physical reactions which the actors on the screen will feel will also be experienced, for the first time in motion picture history, by certain members of this audience. I say certain members because some people are more sensitive to these mysterious electronic impulses than others. These unfortunate, sensitive people will at times feel a strange, tingling sensation; others will feel it less strongly. But don't be alarmed, you can protect yourself. At any time you are conscious of a tingling sensation, you may obtain immediate relief by screaming. Don't be embarrassed about opening your mouth and letting rip with all you've got, because the person right next to you will probably be screaming, too. And remember, a scream at the right time may save your life." 

This speech was immediately followed by a montage of a bunch of heads, screaming at the top of their lungs.

This only made Amber more apprehensive. She sank down in her seat. Corny noticed Amber shift and looked at her.

"Are you okay?" he asked her.

"Yeah," Amber replied, hoping she sounded confident and brave.

Corny smiled at her and patted her arm gently as the movie began.

For a while, Amber forgot all about being nervous. She completely became engrossed in the story about a scientist, played by Vincent Price, who discovered that the reason that one feels a tingling sensation in one's spine in moments of fear was due to a parasite called the Tingler, which could kill the host unless one killed it by screaming. When Price found that an acquaintance of his' wife had the Tingler, which killed her because she was mute and couldn't scream, he performed an autopsy on her, which set the Tingler loose, which let it freely start killing people.

Amber was really getting into the story when, all of a sudden, the film broke. Amber was curious as to what went wrong, when, all of a sudden, the shadow of the Tingler crawled across the screen, all the lights in the theater went out and Price's voice rang out.

"The Tingler is now in THIS theater! It may be under YOUR seat! So SCREAM! SCREAM FOR YOUR LIVES!"

All of a sudden, Amber felt a shocking sensation applied to her. She screamed as loud as she could, jumping out of her seat about two feet. She screamed again, along with about half the people in the theater.

Corny, who had yelled too, but on account of Amber screaming, grabbed her hand.

"Are you okay?" he asked, concerned, but also trying to hold back a laugh.

Amber, out of breath, nodded quickly and sat back to enjoy the rest of the movie.

The movie wasn't done surprising Amber, however. A feature that wasn't advertised in the advertisements for the movie was the fact that one of the scenes was in color. It was obvious that they had carefully chosen the scene which was to be in color, as well, seeing as how it was a scene with a bathtub full of blood, with a hand rising out of it. Although it seemed like it was just a gratuitous scene put in just for the sake of another gimmick, it still made Amber queasy. Amber had always hated the sight of blood. Even the sight of it made Amber sick. It was all that Amber could do to keep from throwing up, and, for a second, Amber found herself hoping that the nurse outside was a real nurse.

As they left the theater, Corny couldn't help but asking. "That was your first Castle movie, wasn't it?"

"Yes," Amber replied. "How did you know?"

Corny chuckled. "Because you weren't ready for any of the gimmicks," he replied. "Every one of Castle's movies have at least one gimmick tied into it." After a pause, he asked, "Did you have a good time?"

Amber thought back on the shocks, the story, the blood, the queasiness. It was then that Amber realized how she really felt about the movie.

"Yes," she nodded and smiled. "I really did."


End file.
